OK, so it’s not quite LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, but the Jets had their Big Three receivers together Sunday for the first time since Week 4.
And Jeremy Kerley, Santonio Holmes and Kellen Winslow responded, making life so much easier for Jets rookie quarterback Geno Smith.
“It gave him confidence,” said Kerley, who hauled in the Jets’ first touchdown reception in seven weeks, one highlight of the 37-27 victory over Oakland at MetLife Stadium Sunday. “Santonio was clicking, Winslow was clicking. We just came out and executed.”
Kerley, in his first game after missing three with a dislocated left elbow, caught seven passes, including the 25-yard touchdown. Holmes, who played just two plays the previous week because of an achy hamstring, had five receptions with a long of 32 yards. Winslow, who simply had seen little action since returning from his suspension, had six catches, including a 30-yarder.
Smith didn’t end up 16-of-25 for 219 yards by accident.
“It’s great to have those guys back,” Smith said.
“Anytime you can make plays for a young rookie quarterback and going through the stretch he’s been going through, the team plays better and we all kept believing with a good week of practice this would be the outcome for us,” said Holmes. “And we had a great outcome.”
Of course, it helped that the Raiders stink.
“Those guys didn’t play as good a defense as we thought they would play,” Holmes said. “They played a lot of man-to-man and when they did go to their zone coverages, they left a lot of holes open and we exploited them.”
Constantly. As Winslow said repeatedly, the Jets offense was “in rhythm.” A real good rhythm.
“We’re all playmakers. We just need more time together and got to keep going,” said Winslow. “I mean everybody on the team is a playmaker.”
Especially Kerley.
“Kerley is like Wes Welker to me,” Winslow said. “That’s what he is to me. He’s definitely a playmaker.”
Kerley’s biggest play staked the Jets to a 10-0 first-quarter lead. Two plays after Winslow took his 30-yarder, Kerley and Holmes went to the left side of the end zone and Smith arched a high pass. It seemed like the population of East Rutherford went for the catch. Kerley emerged with the ball.
“It just felt like backyard football. Geno threw it up, and I was actually coming down on the catch. I saw it, went up for it, knew the DBs were out of position so I was just trying to make the catch,” Kerley said.
“It felt good. I felt good about the game plan, felt good about the weather, felt good about my arm. Everything just felt right. Catching that [touchdown] was icing on the cake.”